T fares going up July 1

The towns with public transit have some of the wealthiest people in them, while people who have to live far away in towns without public transit can't afford to buy into the more wealthy trendy towns with higher real estate values. Your generalizations are not representative of large numbers people or demographics.

its actually well proven

By Scumquistador
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 6:36pm

that statistically lower income and minority people use public transit more than other demographics

dont take my word for it though, feel free to look it up

Right

By Anon
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 6:42pm

They all live in Cambridge, Brookline, Newton and Milton - lucky lower class...

It's also true that the

By anon
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 7:18pm

It's also true that the public transit in this area provides transportation to extremely wealthy places. Feel free to look around.

Go to Dover and see if they

By kvn
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 9:35am

Go to Dover and see if they want commuter rail.......

There are many more very

By anon
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 8:29pm

There are many more very wealthy towns that already have the commuter rail and don't want to get rid of it.

True in many places...

By Laura82
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 7:27pm

But not in Boston. Plenty of upper-middle and just plain upper-class people use public transit here. Who do you think is riding the commuter rail from Wellesley?

As if there large numbers of

By anon
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 7:31pm

As if there large numbers of wealthy and educated taking public transit in this area, while your statistics may be true they don't discount the former.

That doesn't mean that there

By anon
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 8:32pm

That doesn't mean that there aren't large numbers of people who are very well off using public transit in this area if you happen to take a look at a lot of the demographics using public transit and the jobs located nearby them.

"lower income and minority

By Upper_income_mi...
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 8:07am

"lower income and minority people"? what an interesting turn of phrase. Lower income white people and minorities of all income levels? I gather you do not actually use the T or live in a major metropolitan area. Some of the busiest stations are focus around universities, entertainments districts and the hi tech neighborhoods of Kendall/MIT, Charles/MGH. Not exactly blue collar and a minority ridden.

Take a bus at 6am

By SwirlyGrrl
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 9:12am

Tell us what you see.

3 things:

By ChrisInEastie
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 7:10pm

1. The "us vs them" mentality around this issue is really, REALLY stupid. I cannot express this enough. Imagine me standing in front of you right now. Now imagine me laughing in your face at how stupid this argument is. Now imagine trying to get a word in, but me laughing so hard that you can't.

2. You know why I commute via car? Because the MBTA is insanely unreliable.

3. You know what else really sucks around here? The roads.

Yah, but

By johnmcboston
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 9:47am

Us vs Them is what leads the argument that "Transit needs to pay it's own way" while roads, who also don't cover their costs, are freely paid for from general tax revenue.

Will drivers be as eager if we were to raise tolls or the gas tax?

Well I can only speak for myself, but

By ChrisInEastie
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 12:25pm

I have no problem with tax revenue going to the T, and would gladly take a reasonable (which the current fare hikes are not) increase in gas tax or tolls, etc. to make it a usable system. Again, see point number 2: If the T actually worked for me, or at least was more efficient, I'd use it to commute regularly. I'm sure that I'm not alone in that, and am sure that many drivers from outside the city would also take the CR in if it were more reliable for them (but that's a whole different discussion).

But the issue here isn't JUST that the MBTA being underfunded, but much like the circle of life, a circle of mismanagement that just keeps goin 'round.

The other thing that makes the "drivers vs riders" argument so unbearably stupid is that many drivers actually use the T regularly as well, and are no happier about the fare increases than you.

My initial response wasn't to say that there isn't a valid argument here. You've raised a much better point than anon troll did and I'm with you on it all the way. What I was and am getting at is that when one starts trying to somehow make this a class thing, like anon troll did, or act like everyone who has a car is some sort of elitist prick (or the other way around, "Us vs Them" is stupid in this case regardless of which group is "Us" and which is "Them"), they're taking away from the actual issue at hand. And proving, like anon troll did, that they don't actually have any intelligent or insightful things to say about the actual issue, so instead just try to create new ones in the form of "sides" and somehow try to make it a class war.

You're entirely wrong

By Kaz
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 10:59am

It's underfunded on paper because of debt and a decrepit infrastructure, but it is not in debt and decrepit because it's underfunded.

Forward funding was based on a faulty assumption about sales tax revenue growing at 3% year after year:
[img]http://i.imgur.com/3ilRILs.png[/img]
https://www.mbta.com/uploadedfiles/Documents/Finan...

Reality:
[img]http://cwmag-staging.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/...
http://commonwealthmagazine.org/economy/002-whats-...

It's not chicken or egg. 2000 is when the MBTA started to slide into destruction because the state refused to keep paying for it.

I'll add...

By boo_urns
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 12:09pm

"The T doesn't work" is hyperbolic at best and just an idiotic statement at worst. It has its issues, and it has plenty of them. But myself and loads of others use it without issue on a daily basis. Even when trains get delayed due to externalities (like police activity, or faulty switch connections due to Comcast, etc.) people still point their finger at the T.

The system works, it's just needs a lot of rehab to get it to be more efficient and modern. But the state and the MBTA don't seem interested in even installing simple solutions to their problems, like signal priority at D St for the Silver Line or signal priority for all trains on ground level green line cars.

Post edited

By ChrisInEastie
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 12:37pm

for clarity. The T does indeed "work," just not as well as other means of transportation do for some of us. Many of us. That's where I was going with that. But again, my argument goes back to the idea that not everyone who drives thumbs their nose at the people who use transit, and trying to insinuate a distinct and extremely generalized class difference between the two is, again, stupid. Yes, there are a lot of rich people who drive, and yes, there are a lot of poor people that take the T, but there is a lot of crossover as well.

As far as this statement goes:

But the state and the MBTA don't seem interested in even installing simple solutions to their problems,

We're on the same page. While I was rebuffed on the initial funding argument above, I think we can all agree that mismanagement is a significant issue at the MBTA, and I'll still argue that it's a larger issue than money in the big picture.

I'd argue the opposite

By Kaz
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 1:21pm

There's always mismanagement...everywhere. Large systems are chaotic. People don't always know what everyone else is doing. Communication is hard and doesn't scale well.

However, if you have little money to accomplish big things, then a little mismanagement or a bad decision can have an over-sized effect. If you have an excess of money, then mismanagement can fall within the margins and has no effect.

Obviously a balance needs to be struck and we need to continually strive for better management. But fixing management doesn't suddenly free up billions...however, improved funding would make mismanagement less influential on the bottom line.

Can you honestly

By ChrisInEastie
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 3:45pm

look at the MBTA and say that the mismanagement happening there is no worse than your average organization? Employees sleeping on the job, unsafe practices causing runaway trains, self-approved overtime, scapegoating, etc. etc. Yes, money and funding make a huge difference, and yes, the MBTA needs lots of it. But you can throw all the money and resources you want at a problem, it won't go away if these resources are mismanaged. Which they are.

Hell, just Google the term "MBTA mismanaged" and start reading through.

Also the fact that Baker's panel called for a "Fiscal control board" and according to the Globe "That board would be charged with imposing discipline on what the report describes as a dysfunctional agency that lacks 'a culture of performance management and accountability' and has allowed costs to grow unchecked." should really say it all.

Communication is hard and doesn't scale well.

I'm well away of this, it's my chosen profession. I have an MS in corporate comm, and used the MBTA as my focal point for a lot of projects in graduate school.

Touché

By ChrisInEastie
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 12:23pm

Can't argue with the data. Post edited to reflect.

BS

By Stevil
Wed, 03/09/2016 - 9:33am

Yes - sales tax revenue didn't live up to expectations - but the T has garnered 2-3 additional MAJOR funding sources since forward funding began resulting in a doubling of revenue over the past 15 years - i.e. - T revenue has grown at 3% per year. As I've stated in the past - a look at the income statement shows that this went almost 100% to wages and benefits and almost nothing to capital improvements. The T is broke because it is grossly mismanaged. Period.

And BTW - those numbers are 5 years old ending at the depths of the financial crisis. Working in personal finance one thing I've learned from people trying to get my clients to buy crap is that if you cherry pick your time horizon you can make almost any case you want.

Sorry Stevil

By Kaz
Wed, 03/09/2016 - 10:26am

But you have to put up or shut up. What are those "MAJOR" funding sources that weren't one-time bandages or the state increasing the sales tax percentage in order to get more money to the MBTA? They all went to operations and not capital because the MBTA wasn't able to cover its operating costs due almost entirely to gas price and healthcare increases. Those huge budget increases weren't foreseen by the simpletons who put Forward Funding in place in 2000. They aren't somehow magically compensated by sales tax (when gas and healthcare costs go up, people don't magically go buy more goods). The past few years have been very minor increases in sales tax revenue (again, only where they are since the percentage increase to 6.25 or the actual numbers would be even lower).

When you can't afford to run your operations due to gas and healthcare costs, you can't afford to put any additional funding into capital to fix the system. That isn't mismanagement...it's still entirely budgetary. If you've got a time horizon that somehow magically shows that the T should be awash in money compared to its costs to operate, feel free to share it. Simply disparaging the data someone else shows as "what you'd do if you were lying to someone" is the only BS around here. You can muddy the truth all you want, but the MBTA doesn't get enough funding. It hasn't since 2000. The entire POINT of Forward Funding was to strangle the agency...it worked...it worked so well, the agency sank in a sea of debt. This is very plain and obvious to anyone who isn't trying to live through lenses that always show that government is "too big" and "mismanaged" by default.

Talk about living through your own lens

By ChrisInEastie
Wed, 03/09/2016 - 10:41am

When you can't afford to run your operations due to gas and healthcare costs, you can't afford to put any additional funding into capital to fix the system. That isn't mismanagement...it's still entirely budgetary.

And when you can't afford to run your operations because so many of your employees are abusing a loophole and you either don't realize it, or just turn a blind eye, it's both:

"Approximately 43 percent of the MBTA’s overtime budget, roughly $32 million, went to workers who did not work a full traditional week."

Seriously?

By Kaz
Wed, 03/09/2016 - 10:56am

We're talking about a 2000 MILLION dollar budget.

You're whining about 32 MILLION. It's not even 2% of the whole. You could give nobody overtime at the MBTA and still be drowning. In 2014, the original budget proposal had a 118 MILLION dollar deficit to close. Even if that entire 32 MILLION in "mismanagement" (and that's assuming zero employees have any right to valid overtime) had been wiped out, they still would have been short by 86 MILLION dollars, enough to pay that overtime bill nearly 3 times over again.

Their 2015 debt service costs almost match the ENTIRE payroll, overtime and all.

This is exactly what I'm telling Stevil applied to you. You're looking for the mismanagement and then complaining that that's what's costing us money. Yes, getting a contract that gives you overtime if you call out sick and then work later in the week when they require overstaffing or working beyond your 8 hours in a day and getting overtime even though you only work 2 days a week was mismanagement in agreeing to that in the contract. But that's NOT what's breaking the MBTA these days. It's just an easy whipping boy for you to write a Herald article about and then have everyone attack unions or the management when the serious problems are budgetary and much larger icebergs. Congratulations, Captain, you nimbly steered the Titanic around those waves and into the iceberg instead.

Let's break this down

By ChrisInEastie
Wed, 03/09/2016 - 3:32pm

You're whining about 32 MILLION. It's not even 2% of the whole.

Are you serious man? Find me any organization that thinks $32 mil is chump change because it's "not even 2%" of anything.

Even if that entire 32 MILLION in "mismanagement" (and that's assuming zero employees have any right to valid overtime) had been wiped out, they still would have been short by 86 MILLION dollars, enough to pay that overtime bill nearly 3 times over again.

I never said overtime was a bad thing at all. I said abusing the system is a bad thing. More on this in a moment. But you're right, available overtime should be fair to use, so let's look at the number we get if we consider that 43% of the $32 mil that was paid out to workers under 40 hours, which is $13.76 mil. So that puts us at a deficit of ~$104.25 mil instead of that initial projected $118 mil. But hey, screw it right? At this point they're already so far down the rabbit hole, it won't even matter. Absolutely brilliant train of thought! Maybe they should bring you in to save the system, because your prowess when it comes to economics is on point my man.

Yes, getting a contract that gives you overtime if you call out sick and then work later in the week when they require overstaffing or working beyond your 8 hours in a day and getting overtime even though you only work 2 days a week was mismanagement in agreeing to that in the contract.

Hey, look, we agree on something!...at least in principle. Maybe you're correct here. The MBTA needs them, and it's not like there's any evidence of employees cheating the system or anything, right?

But that's NOT what's breaking the MBTA these days.

Sure is. It's not the only thing, and I have said in previous comments that funding is an issue as well. But mismanagement, corruption, etc. are playing a major role. I don't know how you can sit there and try to say that they aren't. The panel found it. Employees have stated it. Every media outlet, probably down to elementary school newsletters, has covered it.

It's just an easy whipping boy for you to write a Herald article about and then have everyone attack unions or the management when the serious problems are budgetary and much larger icebergs.

Let's bullet point this one, just for fun!

I don't write for the Herald.
I have no problem with unions whatsoever. I think they're great, and an important part of maintaining safe, fair working conditions. I think some people use them to abuse the system, but I also think non-union employees all over the globe also abuse various workplace systems as well. Again, no big-picture problem with unions here.
Management at the MBTA has been a serious problem for years. This is well documented.
There aren't any icebergs in Boston, silly.

Congratulations, Captain, you nimbly steered the Titanic around those waves and into the iceberg instead.

Well it's a good thing I managed to find one in Boston and run into it, because I seriously need some ice for that burn!

K, I'm done now. You can reply if you want, but I'm just going to read it, laugh, and carry on with my day.

Go look at the income statement

By Stevil
Wed, 03/09/2016 - 10:56am

It's pretty clear to anyone that can read an income statement what's been going on - every spare dime goes to paying more wages and benefits and almost nothing to debt service/capital expenses. In fact - I believe I read a couple years ago they were even financing some operating expenses.

There's a thread with a reference to Bev Scott and I believe rodeo that has a link in it.

Their revenue in 2001 was about $1 billion with debt service of about $300 million. Now it's $2 billion with debt service of about $400 million (because at long last they are actually buying some new equipment.

The debt on the big dig was probably costing $40-$50 million in 2001. Now it's probably half that - and the principal is depreciated by inflation - one of the advantages of long-term debt.

So of their $1 billion in incremental revenue in the past 15 years - about 10% went to additional debt service. 90% went primarily to additional wages and benefits. I don't believe there's been a material increase in staffing over the past 15 years - there have only been marginal expansions to the system - Greenbush and ???...

Count me as another primary

By anon
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 5:06pm

Count me as another primary driver / sometime T-rider who'd be delighted to pay higher gas taxes AND tolls to subsidize the T. The T is a huge part of why I choose to live in Boston and while I've come to depend on my car for North Shore errands, it would be great if T fare didn't feel like such a splurge compared to feeding my small gas-efficient car.

Even when you factor in parking, unless I'm going somewhere nutty, the car just makes more sense from both a convenience and an economic point of view (factoring in that I already own the car; it's a different equation for people who don't own one anyway). That's frustrating and sad.

I fill up my tiny tank maybe a couple of times a month and compared to a monthly T pass or fares to cover similar mileage, it's cheap as all get-out. That's super wrong and we need to fix it before the roads are choked by even more cars and the last people who don't have the option of switching to a car have been driven out of the city entirely.

No one was trying to create

By anon
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 8:31pm

No one was trying to create sides, just pointing that it's hardly only poor people who ride public transit around here.

#2

By Steeve
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 1:57pm

Your argument seems relatively odd given that the Blue Line is pretty damn reliable. And even on its off days (which was a handful of days during an unprecedented bout of snow), I've been able to get an Uber in a pinch. Paying $20 for a car once is, for me, preferable to all the cost and headaches of city car ownership. With the money I save by not having a car I can take a couple of trips abroad per year, so I deal with the MBTA.

Though this raises (not begs) the question, do you work somewhere on the Green Line? If so, I take back everything I've said given that personally I've actually taken Zipcar One-way from the BU area just to avoid having to take the GL in the winter.

Actually, yes

By ChrisInEastie
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 3:26pm

Do you work somewhere on the Green Line?

Washington Sq.

my bad

By Steeve
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 4:45pm

You have my apologies.

the problem

By Matthew Miller
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 7:58pm

Right now, our public transit infrastructure isn't reliable or extensive enough for everyone to be car free. In fact, with property prices and rent what they are, living where you can use the T to get everywhere is the privileged position. Gas tax seems like a good idea, but it's just as regressive, unless it's coupled with a huge investment in alternatives — like a gigantic expansion, which seems pretty unrealistic, given that we can't get the Somerville extension, let alone restore the E line, or have a Red/Blue connector.

The Gas Tax

By eherot
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 12:24am

The gas tax is actually slightly less regressive because the average driver is richer than the average public transit user. Also, even among drivers, wealthy people on average probably drive cars that are slightly less fuel efficient.

To be sure, It is still a regressive tax, but it is arguably much less regressive than transit fares.

What percentage

By bosguy22
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 9:03am

Of public transit drivers are SOLELY public transit users and don't also own a car?

I don't know that number but

By Kinopio
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 10:44am

I don't know that number but I do know that 51% of people in Boston walk/cycle/T to work, yet we devote a majority of our space and money to drivers.

The question isn't who owns a

By eherot
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 12:08pm

The question isn't who owns a car, as a substantial majority of city dwellers do (although they also tend to be richer on average than non-car-owner). The question is how most trips are made.

Working class people drive...

By anon
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 9:51am

Working class people drive... trust me on that. Most of the people I know who are over 30 and are blue collar / working class need a vehicle to get to work, especially people with young children who are juggling 2 jobs and the busy schedule that comes with raising children. PRIVILEGED are the people who can afford to live and work near reliable public transportation and/or have the leisure of schedule and lifestyle to ride their bike to and fro their job. And, by what means do YOU JUDGE the class and means of people who use public transportation? Your classism and bigotry is showing.

I will never get tired

By erik g
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 3:59pm

of people who see the rhetorical devices used on the left, and try to co-opt them without the faintest idea what they're talking about. Yes. Public transportation, which gives hundreds of thousands of people the ability to live and work in a metropolitan area without owning a multi-thousand-dollar means of conveyance, is a classist affect, and we're all bigots for supporting it.

It's cargo-cult argumentation. Never change, anon.

Does anyone have a list of

By anon
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 4:45pm

Does anyone have a list of the increases in the last couple of years? I tried looking online but there doesn't seem to be a place listing all of them. I believe there was one in 2012 and another in 2014?

As far as a LinkPass (unlimited bus and subway) is concerned

By GoSoxGo
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 9:50am

the price for the monthly pass in 2007 was $59. In July, the price will be $84.50

That's an increase of 43.22% in 9 years!!!

I wish I had a raise of even 4 percent in that time frame.

Time to stop buying the LinkPass, settle on a bus pass and use the subway less.

This is bullshit. First they

By Kinopio
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 4:46pm

This is bullshit. First they cut late night service and now this. T fares have gone up over 350% since 1991. The gas tax? A measly 14%. And Charlie Baker promised no new fees. I'll remember that lie when he is up for election.

out of curiosity

By Scumquistador
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 5:11pm

did you vote for him to begin with? or, really, i'm curious to hear from anybody that voted for him initially and is now regretting it, and why

or, if you voted for him and are pleased you did feel free to chime in too

I'll bite

By RhoninFire
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 1:50am

I'll bite, at possible a cost to my... "credibility" around here, I voted for Baker. A lot of you seem to have forgotten that the alternative was Coakley. While I admit I don't imagine her raising fares on a 9.3% average, she was a terrible candidate. Here's a link of one of my old post from 2014 that listed all the reasons why I can't in good conscious vote her.

But that said, all this rage at Baker. Let me point that 2014 raise... and how bout that 23% 2012 hike. There was also a 2013 threat that created a whopping 13 comments (including one amazed there's so little). The earliest one I can easily find is the 2011 warning one.

I see the gas tax discussion in those threads. I see the paying more for less service posts. I see the old "they never cut highways and raise tolls" posts. The 2012 one had service cut discussions.

You know what you don't see? Mentions about Patrick. Not even in the 2012 thread.

Not maybe it's 1:45 AM and have work and don't have enough time to research more post history to find a difference. But right now, I see the only difference relate to raging at the governor now but not then in this change is the label of D or R next to the title (yes, you can point out the debt and the Big Dig, but I think my point still stands - hikes happen under Patrick after being governor for quite a while).

I'll save my judgement on Baker on something that really shows where Baker is really going. Like if the Mattapan Line actually get cut or how GLX develops from here (with a range between different scenarios).

For me at least, it's less

By DTP
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 8:01am

For me at least, it's less the letter after the person's name, and more what they've done in office.

Patrick was trying to do a lot of good for the T.

Baker would like nothing more than to cut it entirely.

Service has been rapidly cascading downhill under Baker, and his joke of a control board has done nothing but waste taxpayer dollars and cancel badly needed projects.

Despite only having been in office for a year, he's managed to demonstrate that he doesn't care at all about the T or the people who ride it.

Patrick cared about the T, and promised a ton of improvements to go along with those fare increases: new subway cars and trolleys, new buses, new commuter rail equipment, several significant service expansions, etc.

Also the fare increases under Patrick brought T fares up to comparable with other transit systems. Previously they had been comparatively cheap. So they were more palatable, even if undesirable.

Promises, promises

By bosguy22
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 9:05am

"Patrick cared about the T, and promised a ton of improvements to go along with those fare increases: new subway cars and trolleys, new buses, new commuter rail equipment, several significant service expansions, etc. "

Well, how many of those promises did he fulfill?

PS- T fares are still cheap compared to other major cities.

Glad you caught that too.

By Patricia
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 9:56am

Glad you caught that too.

So Patrick's "promises" were sufficient for you?

Hell, I can promise you the world - it doesn't mean I have to make good. You don't think Patrick thought that? Given the timing of his place in the corner office?

Jeez.

I said the same thing in another post. Some here just have it out for Baker, it seems, because of that pesky R next to his name. It also seems Patrick was given a lot less flack for this stuff.

Weird, huh?

The new red, orange and green

By anon
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 11:15am

The new red, orange and green line trains that are in production to be delivered in 2018 were approved and funded under Patrick.

Actually, the prototype cars

By roadman
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 2:02pm

are due for arrival in 2018. After testing of the prototypes, the bulk of the fleet is to be delivered between 2019 and 2021.

wow

By CCD
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 9:50am

This is the most baseless, biased and ridiculous post I've ever read. Patrick was "trying to do alot of good for the T?" He failed. He hired a clueless political hack in Beverly Scott who had a terrible record in Atlanta.

"Baker would like nothing more than to cut it entirely." I'd love to see some evidence backing up that statement, otherwise its complete unsubstantiated nonsense.

Baker has been the Governor for a little over a year. Patrick 8 years. Who has had more time to improve or worsen the state of the MBTA???

Bottom line is, the MBTA has been grossly mismanaged for decades. Unions are part of the problem. Incompetent employees along with leaders who cannot reign in employee abuse(absenteeism that seems rampant or foreman's signing off on their own overtime). Whether anything comes from Baker's report produced by the 'Control Advisory Board' is beside the point, at least we're getting some transparency here. That's the first step in fixing this mess...

I like most people are furious with the situation at hand. I am incredibly skeptical that this 9% fare increase will go towards things like deferred maintenance. People always propose more tax more fees. That's well and good, but some costs/expenses need to be cut too. And the gas tax? It was defeated because people don't want tax without representation- indexing tax increases is BS. Lets not forget that was a pivotal issue in the American Revolution.

Indexing tax increases

By Kaz
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 10:06am

Indexing taxes isn't BS. It's fiscally sound. If you're not going to make the tax a percentage of the price and a straight dollar amount, then you have to index it to inflation/deflation because...get this...the VALUE OF A DOLLAR CHANGES.

If you don't want an indexed tax, then make the tax a percentage like the income tax. Make the gas tax 30% of the cost of a gallon of gas. You can even give it diminshing returns...if the gas price doubles, maybe the percentage reduces by a third or something, so that the barrel price doesn't become a multiplier at the high end.

But what you can't do is what we do currently. You can't say "we only need $0.30 from every gallon bought and will never need any more or less" and then watch as consumption goes down from higher prices, the purchasing value of that $0.30 goes down after 15 years, the construction/repair costs go up due to improved housing prices, etc. and then still expect to get the same quality of roads for the same budget 15 years later.

And FURTHER to that point, this is all largely immaterial to the discussion because we ONLY fund the MBTA through the *SALES* tax and not the gas tax (except in emergency situations to close the MBTA budget gap and keep the lights on). So, we're even DUMBER than that and we say that public transit relies on people not buying shit online and a good economic growth vector that keeps people going to Wal-Mart more to buy more stuff. If everyone in the state became homesteaders, the MBTA would get $0 to run...even if those homesteaders drove everywhere and we still had gas stations.

Thank you, Kaz

By biblioteqtressn...
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 12:22pm

You nailed it. Repealing the index on the gas tax was inane.

Please explain

By ElizaLeila
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 1:12pm

Why won't the Legislature take a vote if and when they want to raise the tax?

They do

By Kaz
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 1:28pm

They take a vote every time they want to raise the tax. They did just that the past few years.

Yes, that's a snarky way of saying they don't "want" to raise the tax. Why? Because it's very hard to be popular and raise taxes. Even more so in a 24/7 media circus. Taxes aren't popular...but they are necessary. Our modern politics is a popularity contest.

And calling an index adjustment a "raise" of taxes is absurd and purely political. It's not a raise. It's actually keeping it where they are at based on the steady devaluation of our currency. What we have instead is a steady decline in taxes combined with lots of legislators more willing to keep their job than be responsible.

I agree that now is a time to

By Patricia
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 4:44pm

I agree that now is a time to revisit raising the gas tax. I will never vote for indexing it, and I'm glad I'm in good company.

You are aware the state and feds make a good amount of money from gas sales, more than the gas stations, distributors, etc. - just making sure..

Nope, let our legislature do their job and vote for the gas tax. Giving OUR legislature an easy out is never, ever a good idea.

Just have to disagree with this

By boo_urns
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 6:22pm

Gas is a volatile commodity, as we've seen with recent plummeting of the price. Why should we want our legislatures to waste time on this when there is a viable solution to handling its taxation? Personally, I think they can spend their time better up on Beacon Hill (admittedly, naively saying that they actually would, I'll give you that much) tackling other issues than getting an easy pass on this initiative so they can say "I didn't raise taxes!"

Indexing the gas tax avoids

By roadman
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 2:05pm

the inevitable "I'll vote for the tax increase if you agree to include MY pet project in the legislation authorizing the increase" debates that inevitably happen.

Non-starter

By Kaz
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 9:01am

During Patrick, the MBTA was an independent body. It had its problems and was critically underfunded but he had no active role in its function. It was the legislature, which nobody in this goddamn state EVER takes to task which is why its leadership is chronically busted for corruption, whose job it was to fix the funding issue (and still is).

During Baker, due to the mismanagement and critical funding flaws, the governor stepped in when the storm hit and made this "his" agency by appointing a controller board tied directly to him and removing its independence. That makes it HIS problem...and he's STILL not going to the legislature and making the abysmally stupid Forward Funding legislation the whipping boy for all the problems.

Ideally

By Robert Paulson
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 5:37pm

We are eventually going to have single trains on each line that you have to drive and maintain yourself at a cost $150,000 per trip. That money goes towards a non-stop round the world cruiseliner for all pensioned T workers.

Charlie is was and will always be a liar

By anon
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 6:09pm

And don't forget who is responsible for dumping Big Dig costs on the T that now represent a large part of the T's debt today. Chuck you Farlie.

And btw, shame on you Stephanie. You have thrown your entire career and what you used to stand for in the trash.

How do you figure 350%? Bus

By anon
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 6:13pm

How do you figure 350%? Bus fare in 1990 was 50 cents.

And the cash bus fare today

By DTP
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 10:02pm

And the cash bus fare today is $2.00.

50 cents -> $2.00 = 400%

Going by the new CharlieCard bus fare, $1.70, that's a 340% increase.

50 cents to $2 would be a 300

By anon
Mon, 03/07/2016 - 10:21pm

50 cents to $2 would be a 300% increase. Unless you consider a 50 cent fare styling at 50 cents to be a 100% increase.

But the cash bus fare isn't $2.

Whoops, my apologies. $2 is

By DTP
Tue, 03/08/2016 - 8:11am

Whoops, my apologies. $2 is 400% of $0.50, and as you said, only a 300% increase.

But yes, the cash bus fare IS $2. It's currently $2.10, and effective July 1 it will be going down to $2.00.

T fares going up July 1

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